Top 10

Hot damn – where’d that year go? So with New Year’s so close you can almost smell the tequila, it’s time to look back at the past 12 months to see what rides really took our fancy. We’ve been doing a top 10 list for the past five years, and for the past two years we have been giving out the very shiny, very weighty Pipeburn trophy you see above to whoever takes the No.1 spot. In an art form with a distinct lack of real-world recognition, we like to think of it as our way of rewarding all the builder’s blood, sweat and tears. So we’ve gone back over every bike from this year to count your comments, tally Facebook likes and scientifically measure ‘woah’ to come up with our top 10 bikes for 2014. Enjoy.

2013 has been a massive year for Pipeburn. We’ve got six times the eyeballs looking at the site now than we did this time last year. And on top of that, we’ve had an amazing run of great bikes. They were easily our best ever. So to celebrate, we thought we’d end 2013 on a high and introduce something that we’re calling the Pipeburn Bike of the Year Award. See that 2kg trophy of perfectly machined and polished stainless steel in the picture above? That’s our way of giving a little back to the scene and recognising the bike and builder that has defined 2013. So we’ve gone back over every bike to count comments, tally Facebook likes and measure absolute coolness to come up with our top 10 for 2013. The bike in the No. 1 spot takes the trophy. And what a bike it is…

Ahhh, 2012… a superb year for custom bikes, yes? Scott and I have just spent a quiet evening in, sitting around the drawing room table while sampling some of this year’s best vintages. We’ve had a few cheeky German numbers. One or two North American examples and a decent tipple of some fine Australian produce. Were we Impressed? Naturally. Looking back at our 2011 list, it’s hard not to be taken with the overall rise in quality of this year’s selection – one that was hand-picked by us according to your comments, Facebook likes, and with an added pinch of ‘just because’. So here’s cheers to all the makers who were generous enough to bless us with their hard work, and here’s another one to all of you readers for frequenting this fine establishment. The first vintage on this year’s list is a cheeky little number from one of Arizona’s finest makers, the very talented Del Prado brothers, which earnt a record-breaking 1.7k Facebook likes. It must be something in the New River soil.

As 2011 draws to a close, it’s time again for our second annual top 10 list – or more correctly the nouveau-fangled “top 11” list as this year we’ve decided to include an editor’s choice for the bike Scott and I thought could do with a little repeat viewing. In case you’re wondering, we picked them by looking at the bikes with the most comments and then threw in a little personal preference magic. We hope you like them. First up is the rather controversial Blitz BMW we featured in March. It generated a veritable flood of comments including a few essays, though it’s not often you see the words “hipster douche bag cool kids” in your average English paper. Looking back, we’re not sure what all the fuss was about – tell us you wouldn’t like to find that in the garage every Sunday morning. More

With the year coming to an end we thought it’d be cool to look back at this years most popular posts. They are definitely an eclectic bunch – but we would love to find any of them in our garage at Christmas. You may be wondering how they were selected. It came down to two factors. Firstly, the number of comments the bike received and secondly the amount of traffic the articles had achieved over the year. Obviously the older stories have an advantage but some of the newest posts actually placed in the higher rankings. Anyway let’s get to it. Drum roll please…

10. Ducati 900This beautiful Ducati 900ss was built in a barn in Idaho by the talented guys at Union Motorcycles. It just scraped into number 10 spot, not because it received a lot of comments but due to the fact it’s still one of the most viewed bikes on Pipeburn.